


The Sun and the Moon

by carolion



Category: American Idol RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Mythology - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-27
Updated: 2011-09-27
Packaged: 2017-10-24 02:16:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/257773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carolion/pseuds/carolion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before there was life, there was Mother Earth and Father Sky.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Sun and the Moon

Before there was night and day, before there were people, animals, _life_ , there was Mother Earth and Father Sky.

Mother Earth felt cold and alone and she asked Father Sky what they could do to brighten up the world, so that she could feel warm and alive. Father Sky loved Mother Earth, and he did not want her to be sad, so he created the Sun for her, a bright burning star that lit up Mother Earth and gave her the warmth she had been craving. She was very grateful, but Sun was so bright and so hot that soon neither she nor Father Sky could rest as it blazed all the time.

“I was cold before, but now I am too hot,” Mother Earth said, and Father Sky agreed, the Sun was much too intense to have all the time. So together they created the night, a time when the Sun could rest, and they filled it with smaller, less bright stars and they created the Moon, who would oversee the night the way the Sun ruled over the day. And this was good, and Mother Earth and Father Sky were happy.

The Sun and the Moon became their children, and they allowed them to roam on Mother Earth in human forms during either the daytime or the nighttime, depending on which was their domain. The Sun, even in human form, was bright and joyful and warm. Just his smile was enough to light up the room and he was so beautiful it almost hurt to look at him. The Moon was dark and dangerous and seductive, and he glowed with confidence. No one could ever be near him for long without falling madly in love with him, under his moonlit spell. They went by the same name – David, but got called different things (Archie for the Sun David, and Cook for the Moon David), and for a very long time they did not acknowledge each other, too caught up in their own worlds to pay attention to the dusk or the dawn when the two could briefly see each other.

One morning Archie was up a little earlier, and watched as the sky’s darkness began to fade. He patiently stayed away from the lingering inky night, but noticed when the Moon staggered off, following his nighttime.

“Are you alright?” He asked, concerned. The Moon turned, and Archie bit his lip. He’d never seen the Moon before, never stopped to pay attention. He was – so different. His skin was pale and his lips were full and his eyes were curious, and mysterious. He smiled, and Archie felt hotter than he’d ever felt before.

“Hey. Yeah. I’m fine, just a little – late night, you know?” The Moon laughed, and

Archie felt awkward. _No,_ he wanted to say, _I don’t know_. Archie had never had a ‘late night’ in his life. He only had long days, or sleepy days, or sunny days, or cloudy days, or lazy days, or dog days, or hard days, or good days. He’d never had a late night, or a wild night, or a tough night, or anything like that. Suddenly, he wished he had, something he had never wanted before. He had never even thought about the night.

“I have to go,” the Moon said, sounding less comfortable. Archie realized he hadn’t said anything, and flushed a deep pink. “Cool to meet you though. I’m Cook,” and then he waved, and was gone.

Archie spent all day in the shade, thinking.

\--

Cook found himself watching for the Sun that evening, as he fidgeted and waited. The orange glow of day was slowly receding and he could see the Sun as he waved goodbye to a few people who were also going to bed.

“Hey,” Cook called out, trying to get the Sun’s attention. The other one looked surprised, his mouth open in a round ‘O’. “Hey, I uh, I didn’t get your name last time.”

“It’s Archie,” the Sun replied, but day was leaving too fast, and he had to run to catch up, and he couldn’t talk more to Cook.

“Archie,” Cook murmured to himself, and couldn’t erase the image of his face, bright and warm and tangible, from his mind.

\--

They continued like that for a long time, for many days, nights, weeks, months, and eventually years. It was awkward at first, since it seemed like they had nothing in common but Mother Earth and Father Sky, but they felt drawn to each other none-the-less. And they realized, over time, that it didn’t matter that they weren’t the same. They had some connection that made them special, something that kept Cook lingering longer in the mornings until Archie’s dark mop of hair arrived, and kept Archie from leaving too soon in the evenings, trying to draw their time out together. But it was never quite enough, and neither could figure out why.

The first time they touched was almost an accident. Cook was just following his schedule, but he felt weird and tired, and it was so bright, so much brighter than any dawn or dusk he’d ever had before. He didn’t even realize it was day until he ran smack into Archie.

“Wha-?” he asked, breathless, but then the sky went dark above them, and Archie was staring at him with huge, hazel eyes, and a bright light seemed to surround them both, and Cook felt his heart beat a million miles an hour. He’d never been so terrified and thrilled and frantic to hold on to a moment like that before, and he hadn’t realized he’d tangled his hands with Archie’s until he yanked his hands away, his palms burning.

Archie looked scared, and awed, and desperate. Cook wanted to swallow his heat and ease his desperation and soothe his fears. He’d never forget the way the Sun looked in the dark, that bright solar flare surrounding them both.

That was their first solar eclipse. That was the first time the Moon understood he loved the Sun.

\--

He spent most of the year pining. Everyone noticed that the Moon seemed heavier with emotion, grief maybe, or longing. Night became even more magical, thick with his yearning as he roamed Mother Earth and ached to touch the Sun again. Sometimes he trailed his finger tips along his palm, and remembered how hot they burned, and how bright Archie’s eyes had been, and how his chest filled up with affectionate. He wondered if his mouth would have blistered if he’d pressed his lips to Archie’s.

These thoughts consumed him, and it was getting harder to hide how he felt from Archie in the mornings and evenings, when the Sun would beam at him and draw near to Cook’s darkness.

“Are you alright?” Archie asked, one day while Cook was staring at him intently instead of answering whatever question his companion had asked.

“Yes, I’m alright,” Cook replied, but he wasn’t. He felt sick with love. His love just grew stronger with each day that passed, and he felt more miserable knowing Archie didn’t feel the same way. Knowing they could never be together the way he longed to be.

But he was wrong.

\--

Archie had long ago fallen under the Moon’s spell. Maybe it was from the first smile, or the first time he made Cook laugh, or the first time he saw the Moon mourn the death of a star – he knew he was gone, and it was too late to pull back. He never thought he and the Moon could exist in the same time, however, and the first solar eclipse left him shell shocked and shaky for a long time. Cook’s fingers intertwined with his made him feel both whole and shattered, quivering at the core as if he were going supernova.

He tried to rein his feelings in, but every time Cook smiled at him they just spilled all out again. He let them be, and soaked in every moonbeam he could, listened to Cook’s stories as hard as he could, and tried, so hard, to be interesting enough for the Moon, who saw so many wondrous things at night.

Cook knew he loved the flowers that bloomed in the day, and told him that there were beautiful, mysterious flowers that opened their petals at night. Archie was fascinated by them, and encouraged Cook to describe the way they looked and felt and smelled so Archie could imagine them. But one morning he brought Archie one of the flowers. The closer he got to Archie, the more the flower began to close up, it’s petals wrapping tightly until it was a small, white bud. Cook gave him the bud with a smile.

“If you give it back to me tonight, it will bloom for you, I promise.” Cook had said. So Archie had kept the moonflower in his pocket all day, pressing his fingertips to the soft petals whenever he got anxious, and tried in vain to wait patiently for nightfall.

As soon as the night started to creep along the edges of Mother Earth, Archie hurried to where he knew he would find Cook. “Here is your flower,” he said, and passed the closed flower back into Cook’s hands.

Cook smiled at him. “It’s our flower Archie,” he said, and Archie barely saw the way the flower unfolded beautifully in Cook’s hands, too distracted by the look on his face.

It was then he realized Cook might feel the same way about him.

\--

“What should we do?” Mother Earth asked Father Sky; she could feel how miserable the Sun and the Moon were, and she could feel the love they had for each other. She felt responsible for their misery – it was their fault that the two could not be together, even though they were obviously destined to be so.

Father Sky frowned and watched the two interact, how their touch ignited each other, but could never last for long.

“I don’t think they need to be tied to the Sun and the Moon any more. I think they can exist as humans in this world. The Sun will still rise and set, and the Moon will still light up the sky at night, but our Davids can exist in a different world.”

So Mother Earth and Father Sky cut the Sun and the Moon away from their human forms, and they were reborn in Mother Earth’s utopia of human civilization as normal mortals. But, like anything, it came with a setback. They forgot each other, Archie and Cook, the Sun and the Moon, and grew up far away from each other. They did not remember their lives as the Sun and the Moon, and did not remember being in love, or the adventures they shared. Still, they were destined to be together.

It was inevitable that they would find each other, David Archuleta and David Cook. They stood on the American Idol stage, side by side and arms draped across each other, light blazing from their bodies where they touched – and they were in love.


End file.
